Drives: Porsche 911 by Singer Vehicle Design

Old, new, heartbreakingly expensive, and wonderful.

The trade of updating and improving motorcars is nearly as old as the horseless carriage itself. Given that, it requires a profoundly impressive take on
the craft for a so-called "tuner car" to gain the collective attention of the industry.

But back in 2009, it happened: A chap called Rob played around with an old Porsche 911 and showed his work to a few people. Within weeks it was a legend,
one that swelled and gathered momentum for three years, during which time few people actually drove it. But then, few people actually drove a Vector,
right? Lack of seat time doesn't preclude legendary status.

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Rob Dickinson's reimagining of the classic 911 shape is, to these addled eyes, one of the great modern styling exercises, one that owes as much to the art
of hot-rodding as anything else. Everything has been pulled and distended so cleverly that the result is a steroidal interpretation of Butzi's masterpiece,
not just some misguided homage.

The process to reach this point was laborious. Rob is a rank perfectionist. He styled clay for a year. What began as a fun exercise quickly proved to be
the kernel of a potential business. It then turned into something a children's author would call a quest, just without the requisite dwarf. The
Singer-modified 911 contains a level of detail and obsession that I have only seen matched by the Pagani Huayra.

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The car's base is a 964-chassis (1989–1994) 911 shell, dipped and chemically treated. Part of the front crash structure is removed and an oil cooler
beautifully integrated into the chin, allowing for the prettier "long" hood worn by pre-1974 911s. A carbon-fiber roof is bonded in, and the rear fenders
are replaced with wider carbon panels. When you see the body in white sitting in Singer's workshop, the quality of finish is staggering. The bespoke wiring
loom alone costs somewhere around $30,000.

Into this reengineered shell slides an air-cooled

3.8-liter flat-six. This two-valve unit starts out as a Porsche six—with a crankshaft borrowed from a 996-chassis 911 GT3—and is then modified and rebuilt
by Cosworth to motorsport standards. Claimed output is 360 hp, with curb weight somewhere around 2600 pounds. The suspension includes exotic-looking Öhlins
three-way-adjustable dampers that cost as much as a Korean subcompact.

I'll devote a separate paragraph to the rims, otherwise Rob will kill me. He speaks about wheels with the zeal of a 19th-century preacher. ("They're everything!") His custom-built Fuchs look-alikes prove what we've long known: A deep dish always beats the crassness of a massive diameter. They
are impossibly gorgeous.

The Singer-modified 911 is not a machine you simply climb aboard and drive. It starts like a normal car, using a key, but before you twist that little stub
of plastic, you will have played with the clacking door handle. Once snuggled into the bespoke, cross-woven Recaro bucket, you'll need 10 minutes to prod
and marvel at this interpretation of a classic Porsche cabin. It's quaint coziness peppered with clever allusions to the past, but set in modern materials
with modern amenities. By that, I mean an MP3 player.

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The worry with this, as with so many customized cars, was that the driving experience wouldn't support the static object. It takes about three minutes to
dispel those fears. The engine cranks and fires quickly, settling to a rich baritone idle through the central exhaust tips. Whap the throttle a few times,
and you know this is a motor with real zing—and individual throttle bodies. The way it wants to rev establishes a clear link with the water-cooled GT3.
From inside, the noise is captivating.

This is a very fast car, and yet the manner of its performance is even more memorable than the outright thrust. Push those floor-hinged pedals into the
carpet, reach forward to the short gear lever (Singer has worked magic, transforming the 964's linkage from good to amazing), and grip the Momo Prototipo
wheel like you're McQueen in the opening frames of Le Mans—this is the type of machine that appeals to people obsessed with cars. It draws you
into the narrative of its creation and lets you create your own reality from inside—a fantasy ride shaped like a flattened Volkswagen Beetle.

The steering is classic 911: heavy, loaded with information, and not too quick. On the road, the car strikes a decent balance between suppleness and
agility—noise and vibration are far better than in any older 911 I've driven because this one has acres of aviation-grade sound-deadening strapped to its
rear bulkhead. The trick is the way it filters out the unwanted sounds and still allows that gorgeous GT3-inspired tune to seep into the cabin.

On the track, the car is grippy, adjustable, and fun. It's fast, too, but limited by its Michelin Pilot Sports and impossible to fully assess because the
dampers offer so much adjustment that owners can basically choose their own setup.

Ah, the owners: the lucky people who can shell out nearly $500,000 on a reimagined piece of jewelry. They will own perhaps the perfect distilled essence of
the world's most famous sports car. Something that is everyday usable without being ostentatiously flashy; something dynamically thrilling but unexpurgated
by modern chassis electronics. Something anyone who has ever felt a longing for a flat-six will instantly fall in love with. No car radiates the passion
and obsession invested in it better than this particular Porsche 911.